The House of Schönborn () is an ancient noble family of the Holy Roman Empire. As a formerly sovereign and mediatized family, it belongs to the Hochadel (German for 'high nobility').
Various members of the family have held high offices of the Catholic Church and the Holy Roman Empire over the course of centuries, including as bishops, prince-bishops, cardinals and prince-electors. In addition to several family members having been elected rulers of ecclesiastical principalities — the Electorate of Mainz, the Princely-Bishopric of Würzburg, the Princely-Bishopric of Worms, the Princely-Bishopric of Speyer, the Electorate of Trier, and the Princely-Bishopric of Bamberg — the family possessed a fief in Franconia that held imperial immediacy as a county within the Holy Roman Empire, the County of Schönborn.
The House of Schönborn, especially its ruling prelates of the Catholic Church, were among the most important builders of Southern German baroque architecture. The family gave the name Schönbornzeit (Age of the Schönborns) to an era (1642–1756), sometimes nostalgically remembered in the popular consciousness as an era of prosperity. Today, the term Schönbornzeit denotes a particular style of Rhenish and Franconian baroque.
History
Early history The Schönborn family first appeared in the Rheingau region with H. von Sconenburne in 1275. Their original seat was Schönborn in the County of Katzenelnbogen. A secondary source of 1670 mentions an earlier Eucharius von Schönborn of the mid 12th century, however without documentary proof. The lion in their coat of arms may derive from the Katzenelnbogen as well as from the nearby Diez counts whose vassals they were. By the end of the 14th century, the family had split into three branches one of which extinguished soon. The elder branch resided at Schönborn and held the office of Burgmann at Burgschwalbach, a castle built between 1354 and 1371 by count Eberhard V. of Katzenelnbogen. Gilbrecht of Schönborn was mentioned there in 1373. They were also Burgmanns at Hahnstätten in the County of Nassau. Several of them became abbots, one a grand bailiff of the Knights Hospitaller. The younger branch were vassals in the Westerwald region, in the service of the Barony of Westerburg, the Electorate of Trier, the Electorate of Mainz and the county of Wied.
In the 16th century many younger sons of the family became Domherren (canons), leading to the extinction of both branches, with the exception of a side line of the younger branch that had received the fiefs of Freienfels (near Weinbach) and Eschbach (near Weilmünster).
Later history
Johann Philipp von Schönborn of Eschbach, son of a minor nobleman in the employ of the then Lutheran counts of Wied, became a Catholic priest in the impoverished times of the Thirty Years' War. He was admitted as a minor canon by the cathedral chapter of Wurzburg. At the time, the Schönborn family consisted only of himself and his brother, a rather poor knight with limited estates. These two initially quite insignificant brothers brought the family to power and fame, and the new branches emanating from the non-celibate brother were to become widely known throughout Europe.
Johann Philipp became a priest at Wurzburg Cathedral at the age of 16, translated to Mainz Cathedral in 1625, and to Worms Cathedral in 1630. He became a provost and, in 1642, was elected prince-bishop of Wurzburg. His ruthless prosecution of the Counter Reformation eliminated Lutheranism from the territory he controlled. His diplomatic skills made him an important mediator during the negotiations that ended the Thirty Years' War in 1648. As a result, he was additionally elected Archbishop of Mainz in 1647, thus also ruler of the Electorate of Mainz and archchancellor of the Holy Roman empire. In 1663, he also received the princely-bishopric of Worms. He was an effective administrator of his principalities and was able to bring about economic recovery. He fortified the city of Mainz and founded hospitals and high schools. His court was a center of German politics in the post-war era. Johann Philipp was the first of six members of the Schönborn family who, in the course of more than three generations, were to rule over eight of the most prestigious ecclesiastical principalities of the Holy Roman Empire.
He made his brother Philip Erwein (1607–1668) a Vogt in the Electorate of Mainz where the latter acquired the castles of Gaibach in 1650, of Geisenheim in 1654 and of Heusenstamm (where he built a new castle) in 1661. In 1635, he married Maria Ursula von Greiffenclau-Vollraths, a close relative of the late archbishop and elector of Mainz Georg Friedrich von Greiffenklau; the couple had 12 children. In 1663, Philip Erwein became a baron. The family thus shifted its focus from its regions of origin, which had become predominantly Protestant, to the Catholic ecclesiastical principalities of the empire.
Philip Erwein's son, Lothar Franz von Schönborn, also became a prince-bishop of Wurzburg in 1693 and an elector-archbishop of Mainz in 1695. The latter's brother Melchior (1644–1717) acquired the fief of Reichelsburg (near Aub) from the prince-bishop of Wurzburg in 1671, giving him access to the Franconian Circle of the imperial knights.
In 1701, Melchior's son, Rudolf Franz (1677–1754), married Eleonore von Hatzfeld, widow of the Count von Dernbach, who had left her the Herrschaft Wiesentheid in Franconia, a small imperial state raised to a county in 1701. Thus, the family obtained imperial immediacy for the first time, and since the counts of Schönborn bear the prefix Illustrious Highness. She inherited the Austrian fiefs of Arnfels and Waldenstein in Carinthia from her first husband. Melchior then bought some further estates in Austria in 1710, Göllersdorf with Mühlberg and Aspersdorf in Lower Austria, from the Counts of Buchheim. In 1717, his estate was partitioned into the states of Schönborn-Wiesentheid and Schönborn-Heusenstamm, both retaining immediacy. Heusenstamm was inherited by Schönborn-Wiesentheid in 1801. The state of Schönborn-Wiesentheid was mediatised in 1806.
In 1726, Charles VI, Holy Roman Emperor, granted Palanok Castle with Mukacheve, Chynadiiovo and 200 villages in the Kingdom of Hungary (today part of Ukraine), to Elector Lothar Franz, after the latter had sent him troops to defeat Francis II Rákóczi, whose property it had been. The estate, one of the largest in Eastern Europe, remained in the family well into the 20th century.
In 1743, members of the family ruled the following states, all sovereign princely-bishoprics within the Holy Roman Empire: Bamberg, Würzburg, Konstanz, Speyer, Worms and Trier, while the archdiocese and electorate of Mainz (and thus archchancellorship of Germany, a position that two Schönborns had held shortly before) were held by a close relative, Johann Friedrich Karl von Ostein. Not only were important parts of Southern Germany under their control, but also quite wealthy regions. The Schönborns were not restricted to ruling these territories. They followed through, over several generations, with one of the most ambitious building programs of the 18th century, including churches, monasteries, ecclesiastical residences, schools and hospitals. Again, in the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, two Schönborns rose to become archbishops and cardinals.
At the end of the 18th century, three brothers, who were great-grandsons of Rudolf Franz (1677–1754), established the three extant branches of the family: Franz Philipp (1768–1841) founded the Austrian branch, Schönborn-Buchheim, until today owning the Göllersdorf and Weyerburg estates and Palais Schönborn-Batthyány in Vienna; Franz Erwein (1776–1840) founded the Franconian branch (in Bavaria), Schönborn-Wiesentheid, until today owning the castles at Wiesentheid, Pommersfelden, Gaibach, Geisenheim and the wine estates Hallburg near Volkach and Hattenheim, and formerly also owning property in Bohemia; and Friedrich (1781–1849) founded the Bohemian branch, Schönborn, residing at Schönborn Palace (Prague), today the U.S. embassy, and until 1945 at Skalka Castle, Czech Republic.
With their rise through frequently repeated ecclesiastical careers, the Schönborns are quite unique compared to the rest of the German nobility, more comparable to the great nepotistic families of the Papal States, the princes of the Papal nobility, since once established, they were able to remain at the top for long periods by repeatedly holding high church offices. There were indeed other German noble families, such as the Walderdorff and the Eltz, who also became influential through church careers, but none did so as widely and persistently as the Schönborns. These – and this must not be forgotten, because this is such a significant exception – did not belong by birth to the great ruling houses of the Holy Roman Empire, but possessed only two tiny, insignificant counties with semi-sovereign status, which could not in the least justify their rise. Nor did they ever achieve the desired hereditary princely rank, but as a family always remained Imperial Counts. Only their elected prelates rose to the rank of prince. The jealousy of the other imperial princes regarding the power of the Schönborn family in the ecclesiastical territories as well as their contempt for their modest knightly origins and their small hereditary lands may also have played a role in preventing their elevation to the hereditary princely status when this was considered at the imperial court in 1717.Andreas Flurschütz da Cruz: Das Ende einer Familienkarriere. Die verhinderte Würzburger Koadjutorwahl von 1716 und ihre Folgen für das Haus Schönborn. (The end of a family career. The thwarted Würzburg coadjutor election of 1716 and its consequences for the House of Schönborn.) In: Jahrbuch für Regionalgeschichte (Yearbook for Regional History), Nr 31 (2013), pp 17–43.
Since in the imperial church system of the Holy Roman Empire, episcopal dignities were awarded through elections of the cathedral chapter and not through papal selection – a tradition continued to this day by the Reich Concordat of 1933 – this sustained political ascent required suitable candidates across generations as well as a well-maintained political and ecclesiastical network. While the famous papal families, after a one-time success in the conclave, had almost unlimited access to power and wealth for a limited time, the German prince-bishops had to maneuver in the confusing tangle of powers, between the Holy Roman Emperor, the prince-electors, the ruling princes and prince-bishops, the nobility of the ecclesiastical territories, who filled the elective cathedral chapters, as well as the Roman Curia and foreign powers. The Schönborns mastered this constant power play on many levels with considerable success over several generations. The episcopal careers of the Schönborns were systematically flanked by advantageous marriages of lay members of the family, which led to significant acquisitions of property. The fact that the family has − for all that − also created some of the highest cultural assets (see below, Baroque architecture) speaks for an extraordinary social and aesthetic cognisance, as well as persistent ambition, over long periods of time.Compare for example: Philipp Thull, Die Dynastie der Schönborn – die glänzendsten Repräsentanten der Reichskirche (The Schönborn dynasty – the most brilliant representatives of the Imperial Church). In: Mainfränkisches Jahrbuch für Geschichte und Kunst (Main-Franconian Yearbook for History and Art) 65, 2013, pp. 131–144.
At the end of the 19th Century, the family owned 226,800 hectares of land.
Rulers of Schönborn Lords of Schönborn (1385–1663) Gerard (1385–1416) Gerard (1416–1460) John II (1460–1490) John IV (1490–1529) George II (1529–1560) Philip (1560–1589) George IV (1589–1613) Philipp Erwein (1613–1668), since 1663 Baron
Barons of Schönborn (1663–1701)